Monthly Archives: May 2015

USDA Introducing Non-GMO Label

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Huge Victory: USDA Introduces Official Non-GMO Label

Government to launch first non-GMO label
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Mike Barrett
by Mike Barrett
Posted on May 14, 2015

For years the public has been asking the U.S. government to institute mandatory labeling for any products containing genetically modified ingredients. Now, in response to the sounds of public outcry and vital activism, the United States Department of Agriculture is being forced to do something. The agency has developed a new government certification which companies can use to show that the product is completely free of GMOs.

Though the food advancement is arguably just tip-toeing around mandatory GMO labeling, it is definitely a sign that our government agencies are being forced to listen to our collective voice, and that they are really recognizing that there needs to be something in place that can clearly differentiate GMO-riddled and non-GM foods.

Currently, companies have the option to use either the non-profit Non-GMO Project’s verified seal, developed in 2007, or the USDA’s certified organic label. The difference with the newly-created USDA certification and these seals, however, is that the new seal is government-certified (the Non-GMO Project seal isn’t), and the USDA Organic seal comes with many more strict food rules than just being GMO-free. In other words, not all GMO-free foods are 100% organic.

“Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack outlined the department’s plan in a May 1 letter to employees, saying the certification was being done at the request of a “leading global company,” which he did not identify. A copy of the letter was obtained by The Associated Press.

…Vilsack said the USDA certification is being created through the department’s Agriculture Marketing Service, which works with interested companies to certify the accuracy of the claims they are making on food packages — think “humanely raised” or “no antibiotics ever.” Companies pay the Agricultural Marketing Service to verify a claim, and if approved, they can market the foods with the USDA process verified label.”

The new seal is voluntary, and companies would have to pay for it. The food products adopting the label would have a seal that says “USDA Process Verified” with a claim that it is free of GMOs.

“Recently, a leading global company asked AMS to help verify that the corn and soybeans it uses in its products are not genetically engineered so that the company could label the products as such,” Vilsack wrote in the letter. “AMS worked with the company to develop testing and verification processes to verify the non-GE claim.”

Vilsack said in the letter that the certification “will be announced soon, and other companies are already lining up to take advantage of this service.”

The downside of the USDA label is that it goes hand-in-hand with bills that are designed to block mandatory GMO labeling efforts across the country. A bill that was introduced last year provided the USDA cert, but wouldn’t make it mandatory – AND the bill would override any states laws that the citizens fought so hard for. An example can be seen with Vermont’s recent passing of a mandatory GMO labeling bill that will go into effect next year.

However, with the complications of a national food system, I see this seal as a victory. As long as the seal is attainable and doesn’t cost caring companies an exuberant amount of money to implement, it will be enough to clearly show which companies care enough to go GMO-free and which companies choose to use GMO ingredients.

Thanks to your vital activism and voice, the government is finally seeing that something needs to be done about GMOs in our food, and that is good news.

 

Sound Energy & The Anunnaki

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This Is How Humans Are Energy Conductors For The Anunnaki

May 15, 2015

This Is How Humans Are Energy Conductors For The Anunnaki in5d in 5d in5d.com www.in5d.com http://in5d.com/ body mind soul spirit BodyMindSoulSpirit.com http://bodymindsoulspirit.com/

by Michelle Walling, CHLC
Staff writer, In5D.com

In the recent Global Energy Breakthrough Conference in Boulder, Colorado, Michael Tellinger shared his theory that sound is one of the most abundant forms of free energy on the planet. He said that sound is the primordial source of all things and is the common denominator of all creation. With that being said, if an extraterrestrial race wanted to harvest energy from the planet, it could create such energy with sound.

There is evidence that the ancients used sound as energy

Michael Tellinger is a South African scientist, explorer, and founder of the UBUNTU Liberation Movement. His interests in ancient archaeology started with the study of ancient stone circle sites near his home in South Africa. In the video of his speech at the conference, which is attached at the end of this article, Michael explains the basics of the ancient artifacts that have been found that were used to generate sound. He further explains how sound was used as energy to levitate objects in order to create the monuments that opened vortices which allowed spacecraft to come and go.

Smaller round circles in the shape of donuts or toruses and ice cream shaped stones were found all over the landscape in South Africa and across the world. At one time, these beads or donut shaped crystalline stones had a higher trade value than gold because of their ability to generate energy through sound. The Ice cream cone shaped stones properties which ring and reverberate with the harmonic frequencies of sound when struck. Stone columns serve as antennae and are found in many of the ancient sites.

The Anunnaki are energy harvesters

This Is How Humans Are Energy Conductors For The Anunnaki in5d in 5d in5d.com www.in5d.com http://in5d.com/ body mind soul spirit BodyMindSoulSpirit.com http://bodymindsoulspirit.com/

The race of beings that dominate and control the planet today as the Illuminati are speculated by many sources to be a race of ET’s called the Anunnaki. The story is that Anunnaki came to Earth to create a human being that they could enslave and mine gold for them. The gold was needed to repair their plant’s atmosphere (presumed to be Niburu).

Michael estimates that there were more than 10 million stone circle ruins in South Africa that were used to presumably connect and form sound energy grids that would allow the Anunnaki spaceships to come and get shipments of gold. This was in the time of Enki, or of the time of the legend of Adam and Eve.

With the discovery that most all ancient sites with monolithic structures are located along the grid lines of earth, the bigger picture comes into play. The Anunnaki scientists built these first energy conductors like the circular stone ruins in South Africa and then began to build more powerful monuments along Earth’s ley lines. Stonehenge and the pyramids at Giza are basic examples, but they continued to get more powerful and complex with each generation. Aerial views of these silica based grids all over the planet show the similarity to today’s computer board circuits.

Humans are also energy conductors

in5d in 5d in5d.com www.in5d.com http://in5d.com/ body mind soul spirit BodyMindSoulSpirit.com http://bodymindsoulspirit.com/

Along with stones made of crystalline properties, humans are energy conductors as well. Humans vibrate at a resonance that generates sound and human emotion is simply energy in motion. The human voice is a powerful energy generator. A shocking discovery came out of Michael’s investigation of most ancient site energy grids on the ley lines of the planet. Many of the ancient energy grid sites contained amphitheaters or coliseums. One can surmise that these structures were similar to coliseums of Roman times or the football stadiums of today. When many humans gather, they create an enormous amount of energy that can be harvested through emotion, excitement, fear, and the sound of the human voice.

This principle can be applied to the layout of churches and the steeples used as antennas in order to harvest the singing and praising of God. Most temples are templates of computer circuit boards. The complete layout of all large cities is based on energy harvesting in the form of a circuit board with an energy source of sound from humans gathered together in carefully planned out places.

Another interesting fact about these energy sites

Here is a tidbit of exciting information that Michael brought up in this presentation:

The stones of the ancient sites hold the records of everything that happened at those sites. One day soon, humanity will remember how to access this information and will use this knowledge to live the way they were intended.

How can we use this information now?

This article has just touched on the key points of Michael Tellinger’s video with the intention to give humanity a few more clues on how to crush the energy harvesters. It encourages you to do the research and to think about how things can be changed now. Coupled with everything else involved with the raising of human consciousness, we now have more ammunition with which to play a fair game.

Can we end the sound energy harvesting in order to in essence “kill” the ancient Anunnaki controllers or drive them off of the planet? In theory they will kill themselves if they stay on Mother Earth as she continues to raise her frequency because they will never be able to resonate with her without becoming aligned with light. Who knows how long that would take. The Anunnaki/Illuminati know this and are on a fast paced destruction of the planet and everything on her. The knowledge of free energy in sound and other free energy devices eliminates the need for money, which would also be the end of energy management and harvesting. The knowledge that is being uncovered about the human body’s ability is allowing more people to begin to remember how we can stop giving our power away.

Here is Michael Tellinger’s video on sound as free energy with a more detailed description of how humans have been energy conductors for the Anunnaki/Illuminati:

 

from:    http://in5d.com/this-is-how-humans-are-energy-conductors-for-the-anunnaki/

Gamma Rays, Matter, & Magnetic Fields

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Anti-matter mystery solved? Scientists say spiral magnetic fields to thank for our existence

Published time: May 15, 2015 16:03
An artist's depiction of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope (FGST) in orbit. (Photo by NASA)

An artist’s depiction of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope (FGST) in orbit. (Photo by NASA)

Why does matter exist in the universe? It’s not a simple question, but NASA’s Fermi space telescope may be on its way to an answer. The instrument has detected gamma rays which could provide scientists with clues surrounding the mystery of matter.

Researchers believe the telescope’s detection of the gamma rays (high-energy light) has provided the answer as to why the universe is filled with matter, instead of anti-matter.

The matter mystery has stumped scientists who believe, based on existing theories, that the Big Bang should have produced equal amounts of matter and anti-matter, which would have immediately destroyed each other, leaving nothing behind.

But, for some unexplained reason, that didn’t happen at all. Matter won the battle, and human beings exist because of it.

Tanmay Vachaspati, a professor of physics at Arizona State University, and his colleagues think they have found a clue to that mystery, believing a signal in the Fermi gamma ray data suggests an overwhelming production of matter – but not anti-matter – in the early universe.

The team claims to have identified a “twisting” of the gamma rays detected by the telescope. They believe the twisted rays are evidence of a magnetic field that has existed in the universe since less than a second after the Big Bang occurred.

The gamma rays, sensitive to the effect of a magnetic field, carried a spiral pattern imprint from the field. Analysis of the imprint and its properties showed the field is predominately left-handed.

The left-hand orientation is evidence of the overwhelming production of matter. Vachaspati and his team say that anti-matter would have produced a right-hand orientation.

The team’s findings were published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society on Friday.

The discovery of the left-hand signal was actually reported by Vachaspati and his colleagues in a paper published in 2014, but the physics professor still had questions, and therefore didn’t “make a big deal of it.”

“We were kind of cautious, and we didn’t want to make a big deal of it, because we thought maybe the signal would go away with more data or more analysis,” Vachaspati said. “And then, in [the new paper], we used more data and did other kinds of analysis. And the signal is still there.”

The researchers did, however, point out that there is a 0.3 percent chance that the results aren’t what they seem.

Vachaspati said that the next step is to continue to look for the signal in more Fermi telescope data.

“I think the most important part is that we’re seeing a suspicious signal in the data, and then the rest is kind of one step at a time,” he said.

Launched in 2008, the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope observes gamma rays from very distant sources, such as the universe’s supermassive black holes.

from:    http://rt.com/news/259005-nasa-fermi-telescope-matter/

Iris Scanning at a Distance

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Long-Range Iris Scanning Is Here

An engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon says he’s invented technology that can identify someone from across the room with the precision of a fingerprint.
Mike Blake / Reuters

Robinson Meyer May 13, 2015

An officer pulls someone over on the side of the highway. The cop sits in the car a moment, runs the plates—they’re fine—and gets out of the car. As he or she approach the driver’s side window, the driver pulls out a gun, shoots the officer, and flees.

This is something close to what happened in Long Island earlier this year, when a Suffolk County police officer was shot during a traffic stop. Unlike the recent traffic-stop shooting in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, the suspect in the New York case, police told CBS, was a “known gang member.”

Marios Savvides, a Carnegie Mellon engineering professor, says he’s invented the fix: a long-range iris scanner that can identify someone as they glance at their rear-view mirror. In other words, it’s technology that could potentially identify a dangerous suspect before the cop even gets out of the car.

It is the first effective long-range iris scanner, he says.

In this video from March, he demonstrates how his technology would work:

As with fingerprints, an individual’s iris is so distinctive as to be unique.

“Fingerprints, they require you to touch something. Iris, we can capture it at a distance, so we’re making the whole user experience much less intrusive, much more comfortable,” Savvides told me. Unlike other scanners, which required someone to step up to a machine, his scanner can capture someone’s iris and face as they walk by.

“There’s no X-marks-the-spot. There’s no place you have to stand. Anywhere between six and 12 meters, it will find you, it will zoom in and capture both irises and full face,” he said.

Carnegie Mellon describes a whole host of functions for the scanner beyond just police use. It could replace government IDs at the airport and elsewhere. Like other types of biometrics, it could replace a laptop’s login system.

As a sector, biometrics are undoubtedly important. Many security experts believe that passwords—and the security regime that accompanies them—are fundamentally broken. Savvides, for his part, sees biometrics as one more method of human-computer interaction. And near everyone would like to reduce traffic-stop murders.

Yet there’s something threatening about long-range iris scanning. Identification to a degree comparable to finger prints, at a distance, is not something our social habits and political institutions are wired for. Check this image, which a Carnegie Mellon spokesman sent to me and encouraged me to use:
Carnegie Mellon

Okay, this is hella creepy! Imagine this with the genders reversed: an adult man checking out some ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend. This cartoon, too, is just weird:
Carnegie Mellon

I don’t mean to ridicule these images: It’s just not hard at all to imagine sinister applications of this technology. If Savvides’s invention works as well as he says it does, governments could scan the face of everyone walking on a city block. It could algorithmically identify a disguised political activist walking down a city street, driving a car, or passing through airport security.

When I asked Savvides about the security and privacy implications of his long-range scanner, he said there were other threats he considered much more serious. “I always hear the same thing, ‘Oh, well now I can be tracked with biometrics,’” he told me. “There’s no need to do that—it’s too expensive.”

“People are being tracked, their every move, their purchasing, their habits, where they are every day, through credit card transactions, through advantage cards—if someone really wanted to know what you were doing every moment of the day, they don’t need facial recognition or iris recognition to do that. That’s already out there,” he said.

It’s a little strange to cite the threat of corporate surveillance when talking about iris scanning, because the concept’s most famous appearance in science fiction is … corporate surveillance. In the film Minority Report, advertisers use iris scanners to serve personalized billboards to people as they walk by, which call out to them by name: “John Anderton! You could use a Guinness right about now.”
A man has his iris scanned by a U.S. Army soldier during a routine patrol of the village of Saidon Kalacheh, in southern Afghanistan, in 2010. (Bob Strong / Reuters)

I proposed a different hypothetical to Savvides: What if a political activist, trying to flee a repressive regime, was identified by his or her irises and apprehended?

“You used that example, and I actually want to use that example because I had that discussion just now with a non-profit,” Savvides replied.

“One of the biggest world problem is human and sex trafficking: kids being abducted and trafficked across borders. And if there was such a system at the borders that could identify them, you don’t know how much their own governments want that, because they cannot control how many poor children are being abducted and sold to other countries,” he said.

“That is more often than once a decade, there is some prisoner who may be high-profile. This happens every day, every second, in some country. I would go to sleep at night very peacefully knowing that I saved a 5-year-old child that had been transported across the country.”

Seraphim Global, a Virginia-based non-profit which works to stop trafficking, confirmed they are working with Savvides.

Iris scanning is already in use around the world. In the United States, police have scanned the irises of prisoners in custody for at least four years. “We have everybody in orange jumpsuits, so everyone looks the same. So, quite literally, the last thing we do before you leave our facility is we compare your iris to our database,” a spokesman for the Plymouth County jail in Massachusetts told Reuters in 2011.

Around the same time, the Indian government began scanning the iris of every citizen in order to assign them a Unique Identification Number, which they must have to receive certain government benefits. The United Arab Emirates has scanned the iris of everyone entering or leaving the country for more than a decade.

These existing technologies, though, only worked at close range. In fact, iris scanning has been defended in the U.S. so far because it seemed impossible to use it discreetly. You’d know if your irises were getting scanned.

“It requires a level of cooperation that makes it very overt—a person knows that you’re taking a picture for this purpose,” the CEO of an iris-scanning technology said in the same 2011 Reuters story.

If it succeeds, long-distance scanning will change all that. Savvides says his team has secured a patent for his invention and will continue to work to make it easier and cheaper. He continues, too, to look for positive implementations of it.

 

“Hollywood has done such an amazing job of stigmatizing iris [scanning] negatively,” he told me. “I develop technology, and the goal is, how can this help society? How can I save a life?”

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/05/long-range-iris-scanning-is-here/393065/

Currently 40 Volcanoes Erupting

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40 Volcanoes Are Erupting Right Now, And 34 Of Them Are Along The Ring Of Fire

By Michael Snyder

You may not have noticed, but our planet is becoming increasingly unstable.  According to Volcano Discovery, 40 volcanoes around the globe are erupting right now, and only 6 of them are not along the Ring of Fire.  If that sounds like a very high number to you, that is because it is a very high number.

As I have written about previously, there were a total of 3,542 volcanic eruptions during the entire 20th century.  When you divide that number by 100, that gives you an average of about 35 volcanic eruptions per year.  So the number of volcanoes that are erupting right now is well above the 20th century’s average for an entire calendar year.

And of course we are witnessing a tremendous amount of earthquake activity as well.  Nepal was just hit by the worst earthquake that it had seen in 80 years, and scientists are telling us that the Himalayas actually dropped by an astounding 3 feet as a result of that one earthquake.  How much more does our planet have to shake before people start paying attention?

Of course the things that we have been seeing lately are part of a much larger long-term trend.  Seismic activity appears to have been getting stronger over the past few decades, and now things really seem to be accelerating.  The following is how one news source recently summarized what we have been witnessing…

If it seems like earthquakes and erupting volcanoes are happening more frequently, that’s because they are. Looking at global magnitude six (M6) or greater from 1980 to 1989 there was an average of 108.5 earthquakes per year, from 2000 to 2009 the planet averaged 160.9 earthquakes per year: that is a 38.9% increase of M6+ earthquakes in recent years. Unrest also seems to be growing among the world’s super-volcanoes.

Iceland (which is home to some of the most dangerous volcanoes on the planet), Santorini in Greece, Uturuncu in Bolivia, the Yellowstone and Long Valley calderas in the U.S., Laguna del Maule in Chile, Italy’s Campi Flegrei – almost all of the world’s active super-volcanic systems are now exhibiting some signs of inflation, an early indication that pressure is building in these volcanic systems.

But of course most Americans are never going to care about any of this until it starts affecting them personally.

Well, perhaps they should start paying attention to the warning signs.  In recent weeks we have seen significant earthquakes in Michigan, Texas, Mississippi, California, Idaho and Washington.  In addition, it is being reported that pressure is building in dormant volcanoes in Arizona and California.  Just because we have not had a killer earthquake or a large volcanic eruption in the U.S. in recent years does not mean that it will always be that way.  Right now the entire planet appears to be waking up, and this especially seems to be true of the Ring of Fire.

If you are not familiar with the Ring of Fire, just imagine a giant ring that runs around the outer perimeter of the Pacific Ocean.  Approximately 90 percent of all earthquakes and approximately 75 percent of all volcanic eruptions occur within this area, and the entire west coast of North America is considered to be part of the Ring of Fire.

For so long, the west coast has been incredibly blessed not to have experienced a major seismic event.  But scientists tell us that it is only a matter of time.

And right now, just about every other part of the Ring of Fire is shaking violently.

For example, a magnitude 6.8 earthquake just hit Japan on Wednesday…

A magnitude-6.8 earthquake that shook northeast Japan on Wednesday was an aftershock of the devastating 2011 quake that triggered a massive tsunami and nuclear power plant meltdown.

“We consider this morning’s earthquake to be an aftershock of the 2011 Northeastern Pacific Earthquake,” said Yohei Hasegawa, an official at the Japanese meteorological agency.

The temblor, which struck just after 6 a.m. local time (5 p.m. ET Tuesday), was sparked by the Pacific tectonic plate “subducting,” or moving under, the main land plate, he added.

Hasegawa warned that more tremors may be on the way.

One Japanese expert is warning that Japan “might have entered an era of great earthquakes and volcanic eruptions,” and considering the immense devastation that the great earthquake and tsunami of 2011 caused, that is a very sobering assessment.

Meanwhile, a series of very strong earthquakes have struck Papua New Guinea recently as well.  The following comes from the Washington Post…

A powerful earthquake rattled Papua New Guinea on Thursday, the fourth strong quake to hit the South Pacific island nation in a week. The temblor prompted officials to issue a local tsunami warning, but it was lifted shortly afterward with no reports of damage.

The 7.1-magnitude quake struck about 150 kilometers (94 miles) southwest of the town of Panguna on Bougainville Island at a depth of 23 kilometers (14 miles), the U.S. Geological Survey reported.

Once again, just because things have always been a certain way does not mean that they will always be that way.

As Americans, we are not accustomed to being concerned about major earthquakes and massive volcanic eruptions, but that could soon change in a big way.

The truth is that our planet and our sun are changing in ways that are unpredictable and that our scientists don’t completely understand.

For example, a recent LiveScience article discussed the fact that scientists are deeply puzzled by the fact that the magnetic field of our planet is getting weaker 10 times faster than previously believed…

Scientists already know that magnetic north shifts. Once every few hundred thousand years the magnetic poles flip so that a compass would point south instead of north. While changes in magnetic field strength are part of this normal flipping cycle, data from Swarm have shown the field is starting to weaken faster than in the past. Previously, researchers estimated the field was weakening about 5 percent per century, but the new data revealed the field is actually weakening at 5 percent per decade, or 10 times faster than thought. As such, rather than the full flip occurring in about 2,000 years, as was predicted, the new data suggest it could happen sooner.

And in a previous article, I discussed how one scientist has discovered that activity on the sun is declining at a faster pace “than at any time in the last 9300 years” right now.

I don’t pretend to have all the answers for why these things are happening, but clearly some very unusual things are taking place.

So what do you think?

Do you believe that you know why our planet and our sun are experiencing such dramatic changes?

Please feel free to add to the discussion by posting a comment below…

This article first appeared here at the Economic Collapse Blog.  Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him on Twitter here.

 

from:    http://www.activistpost.com/2015/05/40-volcanoes-are-erupting-right-now-and.html

Your Color Vibe for Friday, 5/15

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Friday, May 15:   Otter Brown

Things are going to be moving along at quite a rapid pace today, so get ready. If there is something that you wish to hold onto, that you wish to review, that you want to see again, you are not going to have that opportunity right now. That means that you are going to have to pay attention to things that are said and done because there is more there than meets the eye. This is a day of hints. Things will not be put out in the open, rather they will be hinted at, alluded to, implied. If you want to know more, you will have to dig deeper on your own. This is a good day to keep your sense opened and to be aware of things that resonate. There are things coming your way soon that are being hinted at right now.

Your Color Vibe for Thursday, 5/14

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Thursday, May 14:   Grey

Beware the Guru who talks too much! This is a day when there are going to be a lot of people saying a lot of things. There are many agendas in the air right now, and people are trying to set up their teams. You know who your team is. Your team is composed of the propel you love and trust, those who have a history of being there for you, those who can make you smile when you are feeling glum. There are things out in the energetic field today that are trying to distort the truth that you know so deeply. This is a day for grounding and centering, for being within your truth, and for discernment from the deep recesses of your own wise heart center.

Your Color Vibe for Tuesday, May 12

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Tuesday, May !2:   Lilac Pink

Today is a day for stepping back, getting away, going within. This does not mean that you are not to engage with the outside world, rather it means that in dealing with things outside of self, you work from within self. This will bring you a whole new way of looking at things. Interestingly, when you are within, your deep compassion brings you to a place of understanding those people and things that otherwise would just frustrate and annoy you. And that is pretty great news! These times call for knowing WHO you are and working from your heart, working with your intuition, and allowing things to just to be. Today gives you a short initiation, a taste of what that can mean.

Ah, Doggies!

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Why People Love Their Dogs So Much, According to Science

DOGS

By MaryAnn Barone

Whether it’s during a run through the park or after offering a treat, there’s no feeling like looking at your pet adoringly and getting a loving stare right back.

You don’t have to tell dog lovers the feeling is both mutual (and very real), but a new study published in the journal Science reveals the fascinating reason why we feel so close to our furry companions: When humans and dogs look into each other’s eyes, both get a boost of the feel-good hormone oxytocin, which is the same hormone behind the special bond between new parents and their babies.

To reach their results, researchers had 30 dog-and-human pairs come into a lab to look in each other’s eyes and give urine samples. Oxytocin concentrations were then measured in the human and animal samples. In the end, the dogs had a 130 percent rise in oxytocin levels, and owners showed a 300 percent increase, regardless of gender.

Your pets do a lot more than just make you feel happiness and love: They can also help lower your cholesterol, relieve stress, and boost your self-esteem.

If this has finally convinced you it’s time to get a dog, do your research. Learn about active or hypoallergenic breeds, and don’t forget about the many shelter pets in need of homes!

Already have a dog? Now that it’s spring, get ready to hit the trails, beach, or sidewalk with your four-legged friend. Staying in shape is good for the both of you.

Why People Love Their Dogs So Much, According To Science originally appeared on Health.com.

from:    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/12/why-people-love-their-dog_n_7204984.html?utm_hp_ref=gps-for-the-soul&ir=GPS+for+the+Soul

On Knowing the Self

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Self Recognition: Tuning In to the Inner Guidance of Your Body

John J. Prendergast PhD •

The following is excerpted from In Touch: How to Tune into the Inner Guidance of Your Body and Trust Yourself. Published by Sounds True, April 2015.

Self-recognition
We cannot understand, love, and welcome others without first knowing and loving ourselves. –Jean Klein

Our body’s deep sensitivity is calling us home. Yet home is not somewhere, some when, or something other than what is already wholly present now. Our true nature is not some inner state that will be found in the future. It is always here and now, unbounded by space or time. It can never be objectified. Further, the heart of the one who is looking—the apparent separate self—is what is being looked for. Nisargadatta Maharaj said it most succinctly: “The seeker is the sought.”

This wisdom teaching is very puzzling for the linear mind that thinks in terms of someone attaining something. A student of the Indian sage Ramana Maharshi once asked for help to find his true nature. “You are like a man standing in his living room, asking how to get home,” Ramana replied. We are already home—we just don’t realize it. Infinite awareness is shining through your eyes as you read this—you are not who you think you are. Take a moment to open to this possibility.

Our body’s inner knowing is pointing us toward this self-recognition. Certainly being relaxed, grounded, aligned, spacious, and openhearted makes day-to-day living much easier, but there is a deeper invitation at work within each of us—to wake up. Self-recognition and awakening are different ways of describing the same thing. At some point we realize that we are not the limited being that we consciously and subconsciously take ourselves to be. We see that none of our stories and images about ourselves are actually true. This initial recognition can feel as if the clouds have briefly parted, revealing a vast, open space.

When this happens, the veil of personal identity temporarily lifts, and we know ourselves as open, awake awareness. We are in touch with our natural lucidity. In rare instances this awakeness is sustained after the first contact. In most cases, however, the conditioned bodymind reasserts itself, and there is a return to one’s familiar identity. Yet a taste of this homecoming remains. It is like someone who briefly awakens from a dream and then falls asleep again; the wakefulness is never completely forgotten. It continues to vibrate on the periphery of the dream, in the background of who we imagine ourselves to be. Our lives start to reorient around this clearer sense of who we really are.

As a result, we may begin to slow down and start paying attention to our actual experience. We may tune in to the sensations of our body or start to notice moments of silence between thoughts. We may question our limiting beliefs and emotional reactions and become interested in the process of how we bind and blind ourselves. Or, as Adyashanti puts it, we become interested in “the pitfalls and cul-de-sacs that un-enlighten us along the journey.”

“How do I unenlighten myself?” is a subtly different question from “How do I awaken?” The former presumes that we are obscuring a natural wakefulness that is already here. Rather than wondering how we get there, we can inquire, “Is it true that what I seek is not already here?” I invite you to sit with these questions and feel what they evoke. Something in you will respond if you don’t go to your thinking mind for an answer.

Awakening does not come from moving forward, but from falling back. It is a letting go into the unknown. In Zen it is called “the backward step.” We start to track our experience backward. For instance, you can evoke the sense of “I am” and then follow it back to its source—a classic form of self-inquiry. What happens if you focus your attention on the thought “I am”? Can you sense where and how it localizes in your body? If you follow it inward, where does it draw your attention? Or you can feel the deep yearning of the heart to come home and follow that yearning back. These kinds of intuitive inquiries
lead us out of the certitude of the conditioned mind into the unfamiliar territory of “I don’t know.”

The mind may think that “I don’t know” is the wrong answer to the question “Who or what am I?” Yet, in fact, “I don’t know” is the most accurate and honest answer. When we deeply investigate all of our placeholder identities, such as being a man or a woman, an American or a German, a white, a brown, or a black, a hetero- or homosexual, they fall to the side like name tags scattered on the floor at the end of a convention. The simple truth is that we actually don’t know who we are. Gradually we learn to relax into this not knowing. As Jean Klein once told me during a private interview, “Abide in the heart, not knowing.”

At some point, having made ourselves available, we are taken by grace. This taking may be sudden and clearly recognizable or slow and barely noticed—a waterfall or a broad river gently meeting the ocean. Whether sudden or gradual, there is a gravitational shift of identity from form to formless, from being someone to being no one, from being an object bounded by time and space to being open, awake, and infinite awareness. There is clarity, with no one left to claim it as his or her own. It marks the beginning of a new chapter of life.

to read more of this article, go to:    http://realitysandwich.com/315005/self-recognition-tuning-in-to-the-inner-guidance-of-your-body/